Posted on 12/31/2002 4:33:49 AM PST by blam
Tuesday, 31 December, 2002, 11:34 GMT
Planet Uranus caught on VLT
A picture showing Uranus and moons (pic: ESO)
The "Very Large Telescope" (VLT) has caught a remarkable image of the planet Uranus circled by some of its moons. The rings of the planet - which is 3,000 million kilometres away from Earth - were clearly displayed in the image.
The rings are almost undetectable from Earth in visible light.
The VLT is located at the European Southern Observatory's Paranal Observatory in Chile.
The image was obtained in near-infrared, and contains seven of its moons.
VLT is based at Paranal in Chile Two of the moons in the picture, Puck and Portia, were only found in the 1980s as the Voyager probe prepared for its flyby of the planet.
Uranus, which is at a distance from the Earth equivalent to 20 times the distance between the Earth and sun, was first spotted by William Herschel in 1781.
The UK contributes approximately 20% of the cost of the European Southern Observatory.
Southern Observatory's parANAL Observatory
I seem to recall reading that someone was observing such an event with Uranus about 20 years ago, but when the star passed behind Uranus it didn't just disappear like it normally would. It flickered briefly and then brightened again before it disappeared, then did the same thing when it re-emerged on the other side of the planet. This is what led to speculation that there was a ring around the planet that had never been seen before.
Fabulous picture of Uranus, BTW.
Congressman Billybob
Click for latest column on UPI, "Incision Decision in the Senate" (Not yet on UPI wire, or FR.)
As the politician formerly known as Al Gore has said, my book, "to Restore Trust in America"
And which one has the big blue storm? Should be Uranus.
And which one had the meteors hitting it a few years back? Jupiter was hit by the fragmented comet Shoemaker-Levy a few years back.
The suprising thing about the impacts is that the plumes extended 2,000 miles back into space. This did not fit the expectations what-so-ever.
Isaac Asimov even wrote a small essay on the topic. He pointed out that the name "Uranus" was a cosmic joke no matter how you tried to pronounce it.
Said "yur-AIN-us", it sounds like "your anus".
But a short-lived attempt to change the pronunciation to "YUR-i-nus" was abandoned when it was realized that this was the same pronunciation as the word "urinous", which means "related to urine or urination".
So either way you look at it, the poor planet is going to be the, um, butt of jokes.
*ROFL!*
Maybe it's me, but where is the light source(s) coming from?
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.